BBC TV Centre

Competition proposal for a kiosk to mark the entrance to the BBC Television Centre re-development in White City.

David Kohn Architects proposed a family of three totem-like structures that stand at the entrance to Television Centre. Their playful form and pattern references the BBC’s Testcard F, an iconic image designed to calibrate television sets that aired from 1967 to 1999, as well as the geometries of the iconic BBC building. The structures house a coffee kiosk, ice cream stall and play structure, inviting children to this corner of the site and symbolising TV Centre’s transformation from exclusively a place of work to a residential community. The competition was organised by Stanhope in collaboration with AHMM Architects.

The girl in Test Card F, Carole Hersee is in the Guinness Book of World Records for the longest television appearance in history

Cut away view of BBC Television Centre when opened in 1960

The coffee, ice cream and children's play kiosks at the entrance to the Television Centre Forecourt and TV Studio 1